EMEA Masters: The LFL keeps on its rampage, MCK and SUP follow

The round of 16 has come to an end in the EMEA Masters Summer 2024, reducing the number of qualified teams to 8, making the tournament ever closer to its end.

The French league is the only one which has so far not lost any of its seeds in these EMEA Masters. With BK ROG, Karmine Corp, BDS Academy, Vitality.Bee and Team GO, the LFL is set to field 5 of the 8 remaining teams in the tournament, installing an unprecedented domination over the European Regional Leagues.

Today's BO5 saw two LFL seed qualify : BDS Academy and Vitality.Bee. The Swiss team had to face the unpredictable German seed of SK Prime, which had won every games it played - except against LFL teams. Steven "Reeker" Chen shined particularly brightly on his signature Jayce.

Where BDSA truly rose above PRM #2 seed was the midgame transition and the post-20 macro game. The LFL Summer Split winner managed through better positioning and lane assignement to negociate teamfights with much better odds, the range play from Reeker and Tim "Keduii" Willers - installed on Jhin and Ashe - put too much pressure on a decisionmaking-lacking SKP. Even when it came out to sheer teamfighting, BDS was a level ahead of their German opponents

SKP still managed to not exit the EMEA Masters with a 0-3 loss, game 2 saw Dimitri "Diplex" Ponomarev and Iwan "Venour" Skorikov form a strong sidelaning presence, allowing Matúš "Neon" Jakubčík to freely scale on his Smolder.

The other BO5 involving an LFL team was on the other hand a no-show as Vitality.Bee demolished Spanish second seed, Barça esports. The men of Jan "SAJATOR" Zítek were no match against VIT efficient and cold execution. Barça didn't manage to overcome the doubts unveiled by a very awkward swiss stage that saw them barely qualify. Kacper "Daglas" Dagiel was the player that stomped the most the three games, even allowing himself to play a rarely-seen Shyvana.

The LFL exits the round of 16 with a merciless 15-1 record, placing itself far above everyone else. It will potentially field 3 semi-finalists (and a minimum of 2) since two domestic match-ups will take place for the french teams.

The three other ERLs that managed to fill a slot in the quarters are Italian LIT, Spanish SL and Turkish TCL. Italy was guaranteed to have one of its seeds in the quarter finals since DSYRE and Macko were drawn one against another. The Italian civil war saw the hierarchy of the regular season being confirmed despite DSYRE being on a no-defeat run this far.

Dušan "Lotuss" Nedeljković started the games very strongly with 6 kills in 7 minutes on Sejuani, however, the Seo "SlowQ" Ye-bit - Dominik Pawel "Zamulek" Biela hypercarry duo carried DSYRE through numerous fights and skirmishes. Despite a defeat in the first game, MCK went on with a similar plan around Rumble and Zeri, and with better execution, they evened the series.

As he did throughout the whole 2024 season, Nikolaj Asbjorn "DenVoksne" Meilby dominated the rift. The pick of the BO5 remained Rumble, as he only lost one game and revealed to be the only pick where Panagiotis "Empyros" Tantis would not struggle too much against Sebastian "Color" Czyżyk's Kennen (since K'sante was removed by Macko).

The last game saw Matteo "Vigil" Scarcelli and Vittorio "Click" Massolo, very discreet so far, being the clutch factor for their team, nullifying Slowq's Yasuo and the all-in potential of DSYRE. The Italian seed number 2 can feel a lot of bitter in its mouth after cruising so easily through the swiss stage, only to lose against their countrymen.

Sheep Esport's power ranking lasted 2 days before being completely outdated, since the harsh rule of single-elimination eliminated AL #1 seed Geekay Esports, which means that the two 4-0 teams of the swiss stage couldn't get anywhere further the round of 16. Papara SuperMassive (SUP), TCL #1 seed, were not gift. The last Turkish team of tournament has had a very tough session of EMEA Masters so far, having to play until the 7th and final round of the swiss stage while showing a level far from satisfying for a team of their caliber.

However, SUP managed to get the best of their game at the last time it mattered : silver scrapes. Thanks to an evermore consistent William "UNF0RGIVEN" Nieminen, Supermassive went on top of tricky-but-shaky Geekay Esports. An "FIESTA" Hyeon-seo was nonetheless the one who firstly led SUP to victory, giving us an Ahri masterclass in the second game after SUP played very disappointingly the opening game.

After a game 3 where Geekay weren't much of an opposition to SUP's engagements, it was easy to count the Arabian powerhouse out. But giving up wasn't part of Waleed "Dekap" Mohammed Ismail's nor SKT T1 legend Han "Leo" Gyeo-re's plan. GK's botlane was on the front line of a very aggressive team composition (Malphite, Maokai and Yone formed the topside) that brute-forced SUP's strong and scaling backline.

Game 5 was the game where SUP clawed their way to a level much ahead of Geekay's. With a superior macro at every moment of the game, Taha "Elramir" Yurdagüven had gone completely silent on his Volibear alongside well executed teamfights gave the total domination of the rift to SUP while GK struggled to make any impactful engagement.

While KCB and BDSA will play a remake of the LFL finals alongside intra-LFL BKR vs VIT, the two other matches will see the highly-rated HRT against SUP where two #1 seeds will face off with a match - on paper below the rest in term of sheer level - setting Team GO versus MCK.

With their quick 3-0 over Dark Passage, GO appear as favorite against Macko, however, the Italian team has shown that it mastered the clutch factor and was never to be counted out of a match. VITB have also made a statement beating Barça 3-0 as if it was a youth team, in addition to their victories over BKR during LFL's regular season, it sets the hive above the winners of EIQ.

The bottom side of the bracket seems to point us towards a BDSvX match, as the Swiss team was far ahead of KCB during the finals and seems pretty much unstoppable. Los Heretics v SUP is on the other hand the most unpredictable quarter-final, even if the Spanish 1st seed has showed an impressive rise in consistency against USE, so had SUP.

The quarterfinals will take place on August 19 and 20 next week.